


Sweet Like

by atomeek



Category: The Maze Runner Series - James Dashner
Genre: Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Slow Build
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-08-05
Updated: 2014-08-12
Packaged: 2018-02-11 21:06:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,262
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2083101
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/atomeek/pseuds/atomeek
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Newt swears on tea, until he meets the new barista who is the embodiment of coffee and he wonders if the caffeine on his lips is the only reason why he is so addicted. </p><p>Characters/warnings will be tagged as they appear.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Way You Like It

**Author's Note:**

> I'm just gonna post this before I wimp out. Also known as the Obligatory Coffee Shop AU (yep, I'm actually doing it) but is actually more of a Coffee Drinker/Tea Drinker AU (except that isn't actually a thing) so I'm just gonna leave this here. Started out as a one-shot and then being someone who doesn't know when to shut up, it ended up dragging on so I'm just gonna make this my first (!!!) chaptered story. I'm gonna warn you all right now, updates will be sporadic, so very sorry.

Newt likes order.

He likes schedules and rules, booking events well in advance and leaving extra time in his daily planner so even surprises have a potential place in his orderly life.

Newt also likes going to that café on the corner, just after the morning rush even if that means waking up way earlier than necessary for his afternoon classes, because they make his tea just right and he can sit in the same spot, everyday.

And Newt really, really likes his tea just right, Earl Grey with an extra splash of milk but only a pinch of sugar. He likes the way the bitter taste would stain his tongue and spread like hot silk down his throat. It’s the same way he first drank tea, in the hospital and then in the days after his release, when he had to use a crutch just to get to his kitchen.

His friends all drink coffee: Thomas and his standard two creams-two sugars, Teresa with her cup of just boiled-just black, and Minho buying his fancy _grandes_ from Starbucks, a different order everyday because he likes to be ‘adventurous’. During exam time, they all seem to have a cup permanently glued to their hands, downing coffee like a lifeline. 

Newt doesn’t understand coffee or even addiction but he does understand dependency and his is on tea made just right with extra milk and a little sugar from the corner café.

There are things in Newt’s life that he is certain of and drinking tea instead of coffee is definitely one, and there are things that Newt knows is true and that is he is content on his own.

Except there are exceptions and when he walks into that same café at his usual time, instead of Sonya standing behind the counter there is a man with skin the colour of roasted coffee beans and eyes the colour of Teresa’s coffee and suddenly, Newt can’t remember his order anymore.

“Can I help you?” Newt watches the man’s lips, a pale pink, move freely around the words and Newt isn’t sure if the smell of freshly-brewed coffee his nose is suddenly picking up is coming from the man or just the shop itself. 

“Is Sonya here?” He eventually says because that is all his mind can remember after rebooting his brain with a kick to his ankle to remind himself that he’s in public. 

“No, she isn’t,” the man frowns, pauses, and when Newt doesn’t speak up, he continues. “Sorry. She asked me to trade shifts with her since her track club’s meetings switched to morning practices instead.” He shrugs, a smooth tilt of his shoulders like liquid in a cup that’s been jostled.

“Oh,” Newt bites the corner of his lip when his words dissolve on his tongue, too nervous to speak to this stranger who smells like coffee and Newt suddenly wants to know if he might taste like it too.

“Are you a regular of hers?” The man only asks because the rest of the café is empty, too early for the afternoon rush and too late for this morning’s, just like how Newt likes it best. But for some reason, being alone with this man whose every word is liquid-smooth and every time he speaks makes Newt want to drown himself in his voice feels like the most nerve-wracking idea.

“Yeah, I am,” he nods his head jerkily. All his movements feel jerky and he is too aware of it, his awkwardness. “Every weekday around this time, before I have to go to class.”

The man looks like he wants to smile, and it makes Newt’s cheeks feel warm, like leaning over the steam rising from a hot drink. “Then I guess since you’re now my regular customer, I should know your order then.”

“Earl Grey, medium,” Newt says and the man immediately raises a brow at him, studying Newt who avoids his gaze and instead, searches the front of his apron for a nametag, for a name to put with the face and the smell of coffee.

“It’s Alby,” he says firmly when he catches Newt reading the _Albert_ that’s actually printed on the metal tag. “How do you want your tea?”

Newt pauses to roll the name in his head and then on his tongue, answering the other absent-mindedly, “Regular. Alby.” Even his name tastes like coffee, or what Newt wants coffee to taste like, from the smell of it, the sight of it. 

“And your name?” Alby looks up at him expectedly from the cup cradled in his left hand and the marker in his right, poised above the curved side. Newt is momentarily confused and he turns to look but the café is still empty, just the two of them present.

When he turns back to the counter, Alby is still waiting so he hesitantly replies, “It’s Newt.”

“N-E-W-T?” 

“Yeah,” he’s only mildly surprised that Alby got it right; there are only so many ways ‘Newt’ can be spelled, even if it is an unusual name. 

“Right…Newt,” Alby rings up his order and Newt takes out his wallet and counts out his change. He glances up at the pause before his name when he slides over a five-dollar bill with thirty-five cents weighed down on top of it, sure that he will drop it all over the counter if he held it in his hands. Alby quickly slides back four dollars in exact change, and their hands don't even brush. “It’ll be ready in a bit.”

For the first time since he began coming to this coffee shop for tea, Newt did not sit to wait and he will not stay afterwards because his heart is stuttering in his chest as if it is already hyped up on caffeine just by looking at Alby.

As soon as the steaming cup is placed on the counter, Newt mutters a quick _thanks_ and snatches it up, afraid that if he stays another minute, he’ll do something completely out of character. Newt is already hurrying out the door when Alby calls out, “Hey, man, you’re gonna burn your fingers without a sleeve!”

He turns back at his name but his heart is already out the door and even if his fingers are stinging, they can’t possibly compare to how hot his cheeks are feeling.

“I’m fine, thanks,” he quickly says, switching the drink to his other hand and no matter how much he wants to, he knows that if he gives in to Alby now he’ll become hopelessly addicted, as if he already isn't.

Dependency he can deal with, but addiction is something new, something unpredictable and that is definitely something Newt does not have room for in his life.

So he leaves, as quickly and orderly as possible, and desperately tries not to think about where he’s going to get his fix tomorrow.


	2. Iced Tea

“You have to make me another one,” Newt makes a face at his cup of tea, now gone thoroughly cold having run all the way across campus after making his escape from the café. “This tastes bloody awful.”

“That’s what you get for messing up your order,” Sonya clucks her tongue as she drapes her towel around her neck. She had just finished track practice when Newt ambushed her at the bleachers by the track, begging her to take back the morning shift at The Glade and now begging her to make him another cup of tea. “If you want extra milk or less sugar, you ask for it. We baristas are not psychic, Newt, just like the rest of the world.”

“I was distracted,” Newt says defensively, taking another tentative sip. He grimaces when he finds that it’s still too sweet and went down his throat all wrong and he just wants to drown himself in Sonya’s tea so he can forget about Alby and his coffee everything.

“I knew Alby would be perfect for you. Here,” She hands him a handheld mirror while she grins around the hair tie between her strawberry coloured lips, raising her arms to pull back her strawberry blond hair into a ponytail. Everything about his cousin reminds him of summer sweet berries and fruit tea, her very own dependencies.

“What?” He fumbles with the mirror when he realises the implications of her words.

Sonya glances up from her reflection, blinking innocently, “What?”

He drops her mirror into his lap as he sends her a flat glare, “Whatever you’re trying to do, bloody shuckin’ don’t.”

“I’m not doing anything,” Sonya smiles coyly, reaching over to lift his hand so she can return to tying her hair and avoiding his accusatory stare.

“I don’t need you to set me up with a bloody date, Sonya,” he warns, squinting his eyes at her. Frustratingly, she continues to smile sweetly even though her eyes never stray from the mirror. “I’m perfectly fine.”

She sighs softly, giving her hair one last pull to tighten it high on her head. Then folding up her long legs on the bench they’re sharing, she grabs onto Newt’s shoulders and stares straight into his eyes as she speaks, “As your favourite cousin—nope, as your really dear friend, I want you to be happy, Newt.”

“I know, Son—”

“Nuh-uh,” she gives his shoulders a hard shake that leaves his teeth clenched tightly. “I know you like your time alone but there’s a thing called a happy medium and never returning Minho or Thomas’s calls are not it.”

He groans, ducking his head and silently reminds himself to never talk to those two backstabbing shanks ever again. It’s the least they deserve after ratting him out to Sonya. 

It isn’t that he doesn’t want to talk to them, it’s only that they are reckless and loud and where they liked to bar hop or go to Jorge’s bi-weekly house parties, Newt preferred to read a book or drink his tea, safe in his home where everything is under his control.

“I text them,” he says, crossing his arms. “I shuckin’ text you.”

“Human contact is not a hazard to your health,” she waggles her finger playfully in his face.

Newt scoffs then, thinking of all the times he had gone out with Minho, Thomas and Gally and how too many of those times ended with them having head-splitting hangovers, running for their lives or going for a visit to the hospital. Even the medical intern, Jeff at the student health centre knew them by name and probably desperately wished he didn’t.

“Newt, come on,” Sonya sighs explosively, slapping her thighs with open palms. The sweatpants she’s wearing muffle the sound and Newt makes sure she knows he’s still very much unimpressed by the case she’s presenting. “I’m not asking you to date Alby—hell, I’m not even asking you to become friends with him if you don’t want to.”

He raises a suspicious brow at her because from his experiences, Sonya always got what Sonya asks for and they almost always include someone else’s suffering, sooner or later. Her deceptively sweet demeanour works wonders; just ask Harriet.

“I just want you to keep doing what you’ve always done,” she speaks slowly, like her words are made of melted sugar and the way she is smiling right now reminds Newt of everything that is good in this world. 

It’s so unfair really, he thinks as she finishes her request, “Spend your mornings at the café. No big deal, right?”

The worst thing is that it’s not even that awful of a thought. 

In fact, it’s entirely too tempting of a thought and just the very idea of being wrapped up in the atmosphere of the café and the arms of the wingback chair beside the counter has Newt wondering if Alby would make himself coffee when there were no customers, or would he pull out a book to read instead?

It’s perplexing that he’s so caught up in the details of just wondering what it would be like and the thought of physically spending half an hour alone with Alby makes him heat up all over.

Sonya’s hand, cooled by the brisk autumn air, cupping his cheek reminds him that he’s not actually there, not yet. She smiles, genuinely this time and the freckles scattered over her nose and cheeks look like drops of iced tea staining her pale skin, summer bright even in the increasingly monotone colours of late fall.

“I just want you to be happy,” she says again, quietly, and Newt sighs just as softly. “It’s hard to be fully happy when you’re alone all the time, Newt.”

“I know,” he murmurs, and he does. He pulls her hand down from his cheek and holds it in his, an anchor for the both of them.

“Just promise me that you won’t stop going to the café just because it’s a stranger that works my shift now, okay?” Sonya’s grip tightens on his fingers and he jokingly shakes her free.

“Alright, alright, you’re not that bloody important anyway,” he rolls his eyes and endures the punch she lands on his shoulder. 

“Fine, whatever!” She throws up her hands and jumps to her feet. “Then I will leave you to your crappy tea. I’ve got a hot date with Harriet to get ready for anyway.”

With a wink and a hand quick enough to ruffle his hair before he could even complain, she leaves him on the benches with a cup of tea as cold as his hands and an oddly serene feeling spreads across his chest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like this is a terrible idea and I have no idea what I'm writing anymore ahhh And in case it wasn't clear (it probably wasn't whoops), the cafe is called The Glade. And I flippin' need more Harriet/Sonya in my life. Actually, I just need more Group B girls in my life, period.
> 
> Again, unbeta'd so if any mistakes are spotted, please do tell!

**Author's Note:**

> I should also warn you all that I only have a vague idea of where this is going so yeah. But Alby/Newt WILL happen because they are my OTP and it's due time I show them some love.
> 
> (PS: This is (obviously) unbetaed (because I don't know any betas ahaha...) so all mistakes are purely my own)


End file.
